In the end
by Tantz
Summary: Voldemort has been vanquished, and has taken almost everyone with him... **Complete**
1. Default Chapter

Usual disclaimers: I don't own any Harry Potter character, and don't intend to. 

Ying and Yang go together, they say. Light and Dark, Morning and Night... cheerfulness and severity. I suppose it must be true. 

How desolate. I expected it would come to that one day; I have witnessed atrocity at its wildest, cruelty at its hight and humanity at its basest. There is no reason why I shouldn't complete the circle with a desolate landscape of emptiness. 

I never expected to make it this far. I always assumed that I would be the first one to fall, the first one to be felled as sacrifice to the justified rage when one betrays someone else; but no. I am still standing, ironically the only one left of the group of people I have pretended to abhor deeply and never once gave in to my need and temptation to prove it wasn't so. 

There is no smoke, only sterile light. There is no differentiation between the bodies lying scattered around me in all positions possible. Darkness lies side by side with the Light, is one can assume that there is light and dark. I am not sure anymore if that is not just a ploy, a game that some higher, devious entity plays upon us to have us divided and weak. For both Deatheaters and Aurors alike look the same to me. They all look pained, killed before their time when they still had so much to give to the world and did not manage to. 

Fathers and sons were separated in life, brothers and sisters, whole families torn apart because of trivialities that seem rediculous just to consider. What made purebloods what they are and who can claim that by some criteria their blood is not mixed? 

It is the first time I let my thoughts run away with me, the first time I let them spill over the neat, vice like grip I have on them so I will not go mad. And I find that it is not so bad, to feel my thoughts gallop in a frenzy; it allows me not to think of the devastation, the meaningless pain I see before me. What was the Dark Lord but a hurt boy that saw no other way to prove himself than try and present himself to the world as superior to all others? I see his body crumbled over there, and to me it seems he was glad to let go, to die legitimately struggling after he had pronounced his intend to live forever. I believe that life was nothing but torture for him. I believe that deep down he wanted to let Potter win. Even if he had to make sure Potter would die along with him. 

I approach the two bodies, my eyes dry. I don't think I have any tears left. I shed them all when Albus died. He too seemed glad to go, and I hated him for it. I did not go at his funeral nor have I visited his grave to this day. He was dearly needed. I needed him and so I selfishly pouted and did not go to bid him a last farewell. Somehow I wished that he would turn into a ghost over this. He did not. He died in my arms with a smirk on his face and telling me not to look as sour as a lemon. The nerve. But then perhaps he didn't turn into a ghost because he saw through me once more, and realised that at the time I did so very much try not to look as sour as a lemon, even though I failed. 

I stopped giving detentions. I don't think anyone noticed. Things culminated days after the Headmaster's death. It was so fast it could have been only a single day. But I know it was at least a week. It must have been. 

It's rediculously quiet. It's so quiet that the songbirds now starting to sing as the day is waning are deafening. It is grotesque, all this happiness near a place of such massive death. And what am I doing here? Was I spared because my appearance fits best the image of the angel of death? I wanted to be the first to go. And here I am, still hoping that some fanatic Deatheater will see the traitor roaming and will fire an Avada Kedavra with his last dying breath. Before I reach Voldemort;s and Potter's bodies. Somehow I dread to see them and can't resist seeing them in the same time. It's a tandalizing feeling. 

No Deatheater spots me, no Auror looks up and see me blurred enough to think me a Deatheater. No killing curse comes to find me. I find myself weaving around and through the felled bodies like one would around harvested wheat. I avoid looking at faces. I realised what a bad idea it was when I saw Granger and Malfoy junior sleeping the eternal sleep in a deathgrip that betrayed the ferocity of their duel. They were both my students. My heart felt stabbed when I saw them and I could not breathe for a few seconds. I cannot afford to have that reaction again before I reach Voldemort and Potter: my betrayed Master and my reluctant student that never quite believed I was not two faced for Voldemort's benefit. Many thought that my loathing of the younger Potter was because of his resemblance to James. In the beginning it may have been that, added to my need to keep up a facade. But later on it was simply because his glance was a thousand times worse than James'. James never looked at me as if I was defiling the very soil I stepped on. But his son's glance had the hurt and mistrust and accusation from very early. 

It is true that Potter had been the greatest wizard after Dumbledore. Not because of his enormous power or his astounding skills; at best he was mediocre and in Potions he bordered on bad. But he had perseverence and endless courage. As well as an unquenchable optimism and will to live. I marvelled at that. I think that that was what made him hold on to the end. That was what gave him the courage to withstand the multiple Cruciatus and attack Voldemort while still under the curse; how he did that I shall never understand. It was as if his energy repulsed everything negative that was channeled through the snake-like wizard's wand. It was as if the twin wands finally succumbed to Potter's will and obeyed him. 

I think Voldemort suffered a coronary when he realised it; Potter never used the killing curse. That was somewhat funny. I wish I could find it in me to be amused. 

I finally reach the two bodies. Voldemort is like a wax figure. As if he had never inhabited the carcass that I now see. There is no trace of life or remnant of it in the remains I see; it is just a pile of old tortured flesh that alludes more to a half decayed corpse than someone just deceaced. I have no feelings for the thing. For it is an 'it', it's false and insignificant. The true power still emanates from the one lying nearby. 

It's amazing what an effort it takes for me to gaze upon Harry Potter. I expect to see a hideous image of his body after all the Cruciatus he got hit with as well as all the other curses the deatheaters shot at him before he could engage Voldemort, all the curses I failed to deflect or take on to my body. 

But he's pristine, he's immaculate. His skin is ivory white and his hair black as coal. The scar is bleeding, marring his forehead but all else is as if nothing ever touched him and he died quietly in his bed. And here, I once more surprise myself with feelings I never thought I possessed. My self esteem goes up a few notches. I am crying. I still have tears left, I have not turned my heart to stone and turned into an unfeeling bastard. I am crying for the son of the man I was a rival to, I am crying for the student I never actually believed I cared for. There is no Dumbledore now to pay a debt with, there is no Dark Lord to fight, I am free to do as I please, and I am crying for the boy that I wished I could have been and never actually managed. 

"Come Potter. This is no place for you." I tell the prone body. His body is not an 'it' to me. It's dear to me, precious, almost as much as Albus' was. I want to make sure that nothing will ever trouble the poor boy again. Not even the elements. 

And so I pick him up. 

And so he moans. True to his title, Harry Potter is still the Boy-Who- Lived. 

_______________ 

And that's it. I am pretty sure you know who it is who is narrating. Is this bad enough or should I maul it some more with another chapter? it will only be two parts at the most. Review and tell me what you think. 


	2. 2

A/N: Hi again. I am glad you all liked part one of my small story here. I come back to reward you with Part II. I think this is the last part of this story. However, if you like my style and Severus (yes, the narrator is Snape! *confetti*) as I depict him, tell me and I might write another story about him and Harry, based on this vignette. Give me ideas or suggestions, and I will use the most popular one. 

By the way, thanks to all who commented. You egged me on to finish my book, which is now done and so I am taking a break with a bit of Severus angst. Enjoy. 

________________ 

Habits die last, they say, and I am definately not the exception. How could I be, after all? For almost half my life I have been playing pretend. It's not as easy to discard as a Death Eater mask, assuming that discarding the grotesque and tasteless thing is at all easy in the first place. However, there is something that's changed in me. After all I have allowed myself to experience, I cannot hold back my feelings however demeaning or irrational they are. At the moment, I feel one specific emotion, burning hot to the point of madness. 

I am damn angry at the Golden Boy. 

Why the hell did you have to be alive, Potter? I had just started to get a sembance of order in my thoughts, classifying you with the dead, and now you have to be the annoying brat you've always proven yourself to be and mess it all up by being alive. I think I dislike you for it some more. 

I realise I am walking again, backtracking my steps around the corpses and the landscape and everything else that still remains the same, and yet so different. I was planning to do this holding a corpse that I would bury with my own two hands next to the man that believed in the boy enough to give up his life for him. Yes, I do believe Albus would like to have the bloody Gryffindor next to him. But Albus will be all alone now, because the stupid kid is alive. Why did he have to be alive? 

He moans again. It's a painful sound. I can hear by his shaky, shallow breath that immaculate as he seems, he is seriously hurt. I shift my hold on him so that he won't be more laboured than necessary. 

"We're going to Hogwarts, Potter. Stop the whining." I tell him. My voice is sharp, not at all encouraging or warm or anything to hold on to. For an insane moment, I wish Black was around. He would know how to coach Harry Potter to consciousness. I just manage to make him gurgle. 

I bite my lips. There is one quality in my reasoning and my thinking that I have always hated. An intuition by far outshining Trelawney's Sight, assuming she can see anything even with those mostrous glasses of hers. It seems that my greatest fears or offhanded wishes always come true. The wishes that I never truly wish to come true always materialize, just as those that I would even pray for never do. It's ironic. I had many times wished James Potter dead, him and all his family, and it happened even as I tried to prevent it; I wished for Black dead, and it happened. I wished for McGonagall to trip over her robes once and it happened. I regretted every single wish coming true. Well, maybe not the one about McGonagall. 

Potter's gurgling sound comes somewhat louder. I know what it means. The minute I realise it my knees buckle up and I kneel with him in my arms. No, boy, don't die on me. Can't you realise when one does not -mean- something? Why do you have to obey the one order I don't want you to follow? 

I want to set him down and try to save him. I peer around me. Deatheaters in grotesque positions with the waxiness of death leer at random sides depending on how they have landed, and aurors are completing the design of crisscrossing bodies. No. This is not the place to set him down. He needs to be somewhere cleaner, at least, and I need room to work. 

"Hold on, Potter, or the points taken from your house will be abysmal." 

What an empty threat. As if there is a House Cup to worry about at this stage. As if anyone cares at all what colour the flags will be at the end of the term banquet. There isn't going to even -be- a banquet. 

I have lost my wand, but Potter is still desperately holding his. I pry it from his fingers and point it to him. 

"_Effectio Stasis_" I whisper, and the boy goes limp in my hands, not breathing, not moaning. For a brief second dread washes over me that I have killed the boy instead of bringing him to stasis, so that whetever it is that is eating away his life will wait until I have found a more appropriate place to treat him. 

I scramble upwards and clutch the limp body to my chest as I break into a mad dash for Hogwarts castle. It's amazing how small the boy is. It's amazing how nobody had actually noticed enough to make fun of him for being one of the shortest boys in his class. Not even Malfoy ever chided him for that. It's only now that I realise how petite and thin he is. 

I get angry all over again. What significance is it that I hadn't noticed up to now? As if I didn't have anything more important in my mind but Potter's measurements! 

I feel myself winded. Odd. I usually can run for miles. Multiple crucio sessions have made my stamina and tolerance levels skyrocket. But I am winded. I cannot possibly run anymore, and the castle is down the hill, still a prop in the general view. I turn around. At least the battlefield isn't visible anymore. That's something. It allows me to remove myself from that reality even for a while. 

Or it would, if it weren't for Potter limp in my arms as if he were already dead. His wand is still in my hand. There is positivism, warmth resonating from it. Potter's signature. There is no doubt that his heart had always been in the right place. Which is more than I can say for myself. I start running again, regardless my body's protestation. Or perhaps because of them. 

Dammit! Why do I always compare myself to the little squirt? Especially now that he is not dead but alive. It is, ironically, much easier to admit that someone that has passed on had been your better. Perhaps not so ironic. After all, anyone dead is gone, and except in memory, you don't have to measure up to them in reality. And just when I had admitted to myself that Potter was better than me, he had to be alive! 

For another brief bout of madness, I am tempted to kill him just because. I never tried to look nice, not even to me. But the madness is gone as fast as it came and I am once again steadfast in my resolution to save the boy. 

It is just as well that with my musings I finally reach Hogwarts. The castle is unharmed. Albus protected it with his life, just as Lily had her son. The rest of us only assisted in Voldemort's maddened assault when he saw that by killing the Headmaster he had not weakened, but strengthened the castle's wards and guards to the utmost. But I don't want to remember this, not now, not yet. 

I enter the main hall, and I cannot make an appearance as I would like, with banging sounds and swishing garments. For one, I have lost my beloved cloak, and nothing can billow around me anymore. For two, I am too tired to storm through, and Potter is getting heavier in my arms. 

There are students in the castle. As a matter of fact everyone up to the fourth year is still here, staring at me wide eyed, with fear or even terror in their eyes. Lupin and Flitwick keep them at bay, but even they have frozen, looking not to me, but to the burden in my arms. For a while, I am tempted to let them believe that Potter is dead. I even start to announce it. 

But then I see Lupin's terrified eyes, the hurt and torture in them, and I realise that I cannot do it. I must have grown soft without Voldemort or Albus around. When Albus was here, I could count on him to be the gentle one so I could be as nasty as I liked. But now there will be nobody to soften the trauma I will inflict, and therefore I have no right now to inflict it without thought. 

Blast you, Albus! 

"He's alive." I hear myself say curtly and with contempt. Everyone breathes more easily and I have rested enough to walk through quickly. Lupin trails after me and stutters like Longbottom would, were he still the inane young imbecile and not a venomous deatheater wannabe. Another burden on my soul. Perhaps if I hadn't been so hard on him, he would not have had so much hatred in him. 

I reach the infirmary and expect Poppy to flutter around me. But after I stand there waiting to be relieved of Potter, I realise Poppy is not coming to my aid again. Most medi-witches died in the battle and Poppy was one of them. 

I set the boy in a bed and throw all the covers away. Then I strip him of his robe and sweater and point his wand to his chest. The diagnosis is as I expected. Far too many ribs have punctured his lungs and the blood has been pooling in them. It has to be let out, and quickly. He has not much time left. 

"_Finite Incantatem_" I mutter. I know that any spell at this moment will burden his heart, and that will only lead the boy to death faster. I look around and see what I need. The boy's shallow, gurgling breathing is maddening. 

"_Accio Knife_". 

I plunge it from the side between specific ribs, and it goes in with a sickening sound of paper tearing. The boy is much too thin. A growl and a punch is my reward for my efforts. 

Blast, I had forgotten about Lupin. 

"Killer!" he says with teary eyes as he tries to strangle me. I have not much energy, and I need it all for Potter. 

"Let me go." I manage to croak. Something in the way I say it, or something he realises makes him release me. I stay where I am for a few seconds. I realise the gurgling has stopped. If only the breathing has continued. Then perhaps there is a reason why I was left alive. After all, Poppy wouldn't dream of using muggle means to treat the boy and she would fail. 

Lupin is helping me up. His hands are bloody, sign that he has touched the boy and has found his condition acceptable enough to let me live and in addition help me. 

"I'm sorry. Help him." he says in a raspy voice and I just do it. Using magic this time, I set the ribs right and then I heal as much as I dare his lungs. Then finally, I remove the knife that has been letting the blood from the lungs flow so that there would be room in them for air. Lupin is crying near me. 

"Stop that sniffling. He's going to be okay." I snap at him. I would love to go unconscious there and then, but that is not possible. I have to stay and monitor the boy. 

Something happens that startles me when I am in a state I believe nothing can jog me. Lupin takes my hands, regardless the blood, and kisses them as if I am some kind of muggle priest or something. 

"Thank you." he mutters as I pull them back, more because of embarrassment than dislike. I am about to reproach him for his conduct, but then I remember that he has lost far more than me. After all, the only one I really cared about was Albus. But he was attached almost to everyone, including Potter's classmates and Black. I swallow my words and say instead 

"It's fine, Lupin." For the first time, I don't let my facade make my voice venomus. For the first time, I let his thanks warm my heart. 

For after all, Harry Potter is going to live, and I helped him do it. Openly this time. 

_______________ 

And that's all. I call this story done, with the prospect of a sequel if you like it enough. I hope you enjoyed as much as I did. Severus stabbing Harry legitimately is not something that happens often, is it now? *chuckles* 


End file.
